It would be difficult to live in Canada and not have heard about stem cell research. Stem cell research offers various opportunities for developing new advanced medical therapies for many diseases and new way to discover fundamental questions of medical science (Michael, 2003). Stem cells are unspecialized cells that can self renew indefinitely and also differentiate into more mature cells with specific functions. Research on human embryonic stem cells however is conflicting issue due to different views held in our society about the legal and moral status of the early embryo.
Stem cell research is really a good idea; it will help us to rebuild all types of cells and stem cell treatments will help in situation like nerve cell damage caused by stoke, degenerative conditions involving damaged brain cells, e.g. Alzheimer’s disease and Parkinson’s disease and diabetes, by restoring insulin-secreting cells (Michael, 2003). Stem cells could allow drugs to be more easily tested without any need of using laboratory animal as a proxy (Daniel, 2002).
Stem cells are undifferentiated cells that are the foundation cells to all other cell types. Also known as embryonic stem cells which simply mean these ideal cells are retrieved from fertilized embryos under a week old, these are called blastocysts.
These blastocysts are then obtained to create independent cell lines (Daniel, 2002). Once these cell lines are established they are then capable of developing into many specific cell types (Nancy, 2004). These embryonic stem cells are so important to scientists because they have the potential to become any other cell in the body. This means theses stem cells, when cultured and isolated, develop into a variety of important adult cells such as bone marrow, liver, or blood cells.
Researchers should be allowed to do research on human embryos left over from infertility treatments with the permission of couples for whom the embryos were created......
